After playing "The Evil Within" 3 years back I always expected a sequel to be in the works considering that the first game ended abruptly with some open questions in mind. Come 2017, and "The Evil Within 2" came which was much better than the first and improved upon each and everything in terms of gameplay and story and also providing new players a fresh and exciting experience.

The protagonist of this game, Detective Sebastian Castellanos sets out to find his lost daughter, Lily who apparently was killed in a fire accident in their house. As he delves deeper into the story, he finds a big conspiracy involved and it ties up with some of the original's game story in a great way. I have to say that the story of the first game was a little confusing and all over the place but in this game they actually explain the plot very well through notes and cutscenes and makes us care for the characters and their situations.

While the first game was famous for its spooky victorian horror settings like an abandoned village, a haunted asylum, cemeteries and creepy mausoleums and dungeons, the second game goes for a more modern look with towns and buildings while occassionally showing us some medieval surroundings. Its a great contrast with the original and makes it stand out as a different game environmentally. Also, the game is less scary and disturbing than the original and goes for more of the psychological aspects. The villains were shown in great detail and the game explains their motifs for their behaviour very well. One of the best things which I loved about this game was the character of Sebastian, the protagonist and how he as become much more developed and third dimensional than in the first game. He is one of my favourite video game characters as I was able to connect to him much more and i would love to see him again.

The enemies in this game are for the most part like the first part but with more variety in terms of movement and sensing ability. Also, there are some intense boss fights and the difficulty is much ramped up. This time the game is more open world in nature and you can do side missions which give you special items and also search for supplies and upgrades for your arsenal while choosing to engage the enemies strategically . Its a great improvement from the first game which was linear in nature and you will often be underpowered against many enemies in the game especially if you are playing on one of the higher difficulties like "Survival" or "Nightmare" which is the recommended settings for this game. The rewards for completing side missions, killing enemies and exploring items and finding new weapons are great in this game giving players the incentive to search everywhere making the game more lengthy. As for upgrades you can upgrade weapons and craft ammunition for them by finding weapon parts and your abilities via green gel like in the first game. Also, a side note that not all levels in this game are open world in nature and the later levels go back to the linear formula but its still enjoyable nonetheless.

The game definitely gives the vibes of survival horror as ammo is always scarce and your weapons don't do much damage till they are upgraded to their maximum level with some combat skills. You can choose to play the game through stealh or combat or a mixture of both adding to variety in gameplay. Its more enjoyable and fun to play than the first game.

Performance wise I experienced 2 crashes on my Nvidia card and the game had some micro stuttering exclusive to Nvidia cards only which I was able to solve by tweaking settings in the Nvidia inspector by help on the steam forums. Apart from that the game is extremely well optimized and ran at solid 60 FPS.

I would recommend this game for all of you who loved the first game and are looking for a more intense survival horror experience. This a must buy for Halloween and in the heart of all the horror, bloodshed and scares lies an emotional and touching story which will move you in a good way.

I give it 9 Green Gel bottles out of 10. Buy it !!!!